We need more Muslim MPs like Sadiq Khan

Thursday 7 February 2008 08:53 BST

Sadiq Khan: Not a man to be swayed by flattery and condescension

I wouldn't be surprised if Jack Straw has known for a while that the cops were listening in on the prison conversations of Tooting MP Sadiq Khan. Call me cynical, but Straw's stuttering denials sound like tremors of fraudulence. Evidence is emerging that powerful people, including our justice secretary, had problems with Khan and disapproved of the MP visiting his childhood mate and constituent Babar Ahmad, awaiting extradition to the US on terrorism charges.

For although Khan has been made a whip, unfortunately for them he isn't a Muslim they can "manage" with flattery and condescension. Straw is at ease with Adam Patel, chief henchman of Blackburn, elevated to the Lords by Straw, and with other Muslim peers, MPs and community brokers who play the obsequious subjects and never directly confront their masters. At a Downing Street reception last week, there they were, the embarrassing genuflectors, crowding the PM.

By contrast, Lord Ahmed, Lord Bhatia and Sadiq Khan are their own men - and thus unnerving for imperial sorts in Parliament. Of the three, Khan is the most challenging. He is suave, personable and astute, a sharp lawyer who worked with the doughty human rights solicitor Louise Christian and with Liberty. He condemns our actions in Iraq and has voted against iniquitous anti-terrorism laws; he is also a smooth political operator. The powerful get the heebie-jeebies around him. They bugged him because he bugs them.

So it is, too, with other super-confident Muslims who have emerged in the past decade. We are obviously not supporters of terrorism, not apologists for all things "Islamic", not humble either, but citizens who understand rights and obligations and expect to be treated as equals. The old guard, epitomised by Straw, can't deal with us, doesn't get us.

Yet people comfortable in their bicultural skin, like Khan, hold the key to a peaceful future. To his credit Brown has brought in young blood and ministers such as Hazel Blears and David Miliband, who, thankfully, have no problem with assertive Muslims. They actively seek creative, intelligent ideas to break the hold of the fundamentalists.

But after this scandal, they had better do right by Sadiq Khan, otherwise trust will be shaken, suspicion stirred once again that in this land the most upstanding Muslim is still only ever a potential terrorist. And imagine what that could mean for the security of our nation.